John Kerry: Media shouldn’t cover terrorist attacks

John Kerry, US Senator from Massachusetts, speaks in 2005. Wikimedia Commons

John Kerry, US Senator from Massachusetts, speaks in 2005. Wikimedia Commons

While speaking at a press conference in Bangladesh, Secretary of State John Kerry, who, by the way, served in Vietnam, said the media shouldn’t cover terrorist activity as much as it does so people won’t know what is going on, the Weekly Standard reported Monday.

“Remember this: No country is immune from terrorism,” he said. “It’s easy to terrorize. Government and law enforcement have to be correct 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. But if you decide one day you’re going to be a terrorist and you’re willing to kill yourself, you can go out and kill some people. You can make some noise. Perhaps the media would do us all a service if they didn’t cover it quite as much. People wouldn’t know what’s going on.”

Let that sink in for a moment. Kerry is essentially saying that the public should be kept in the dark regarding the growing number of terror attacks taking place around the world.

The Weekly Standard said this echoes comments he made at the United Nations last September:

First, in confronting terrorism, we have to take a comprehensive approach. That was quite eloquently talked about by our heads of state at the Countering Violent Extremism Summit that President Obama hosted. There was a great deal of discussion. I thought there were some very articulate statements about how one approaches the root causes. We have to deny safe haven, disrupt the flow of foreign fighters, block access to financing, and expose the lies that terrorist groups propagate – and that is particularly challenging in this world of constant media, constant access, 24/7/365. We’re living in a very different world, and terrorists have learned how to exploit that media in all kinds of ways.

Last month Kerry claimed ISIS to be “on the run,” but since that’s totally not true, maybe the media could do the administration a favor and not report their failings. John Kerry would obviously appreciate that.